Confessions of an English Opium-Eater
Thomas De Quincey
05 September 2019
9781529013177Synopsis
Explosive and unforgiving, Confessions of an English Opium-Eater describes in searing detail the pleasure, pain and mind-expanding powers of opium.
Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library, a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket-sized classics with gold-foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition is introduced by biographer, critic and academic Dr Frances Wilson.
Thomas De Quincey takes us on a journey from his grammar school childhood to his homeless adolescence in Wales, from befriending prostitutes during his nocturnal wanderings in London to enrolling at Oxford University only to drop out when his drug use overcomes him. Thrust into a disorientating world of extreme euphoria and vivid nightmares, De Quincey’s life story is both unpredictable and deeply personal. Confessions of an English Opium-Eater is considered to be the first published autobiography to explore the lure and effects of addiction.
Among the best essayists of the Romantic era . . . De Quincey may be viewed as a proto-Burroughs, as well as a British cousin to Edgar Allan Poe and Charles BaudelaireWashington Post
Thomas De Quincey was the original cosmonaut of inner space, his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater predating the wave of drug buddy literature from William Burroughs to Irvine Welsh by half a century or moreGlasgow Herald
A stimulating cocktail: exotic dream sequences conjured up in baroque prose-poetry, camp Gothic effects worthy of Hammer Horror, classical quotations, London street-slang and sprawling footnotes on German philosophyMail on Sunday
